It's not too late!

For any people who took part in the Tree O'Clock challenge between 11am and noon on Saturday 5th December, its not too late to send in the photos and details of your tree planting. National Tree Week and Breathing Places have extended the deadline for the photos to be sent in for counting. We can still "plant a world record"!

The Breathing Places website says that one record has already been broken (most trees planted by 100 people at a single site in one hour). In fact, this was broken at three different sites in the UK. Amazingly, at Gransha Park, alongside the river Foyle in Ireland, 26,422 trees were planted in one hour by a group of 100 people. And the main record (most trees planted by any number of people in one hour) can still be broken, if you send in your photos in to the organisers. Click here for instructions on how to do this.

We managed to plant a tree or two in our garden, as I'm sure many of you did too. However, this wasn't really part of the Tree O'Clock challenge. We bought some trees beforehand which weren't on the list of six trees provided for free by the organisers. So our results aren't really valid, and we didn't send the photos in. But I guess the aim of the event was to plant a good number of trees, and this, we have achieved :-)

The first plant in the ground was a Contoneaster tree. The photo was taken by me after school today.

Hopefully, next year, the berries from the tree will do a great job on feeding the birds too. I wonder what this shrub will look like in a couple of years?

We also planted a Rowan tree, which we did get for free from the organisers- but on the Sunday, so, again, it didn't count towards the world record. Although I didn't take a photo of this, as it really is just a twig sticking out of the ground at the moment!

Other shrubs which we planted were little Holly bushes. We planted eight of these most at the end of the garden underneath our conifers, although these are only little too...

We also planted a Hawthorn, which is, again, at the end of the garden. Hopefully, the blossom from this will be a nice sight next spring.

Elsewhere in the garden, there is still a little bit of colour to be seen-but only if you look carefully. Against our fence, near our conservatory, some winter-flowering Jasmines can be seen at the moment. Their bright yellow flowers really make that corner of the garden more colourful every winter. The lilies in our pond have just about finished flowering, so these are just about the last colourful plants left for this year.

One last note- still no birds roosting in our cosy nest box, despite the freezing temperature tonight. Maybe it will take a little longer for the birds to get used to its new location. Maybe the new year will see Blue and Great Tits investigate our nest box ready for spring.

Spot the spring blossom

Here I am posting on 1st March 09 and our suburban garden is showing some definite signs that spring is here. Apparently spring "officially" starts on 21st March. Most years this is roughly true, although it seems to be coming earlier and earlier each year. I don't think that the date of 21st March is particularly accurate as the transition between winter and spring is gradual. But as far as I can tell, the long winter is over and spring is beginning!

The best way of telling if spring is underway in our garden is the blossom on our apricot tree. At the moment, the blossom is just coming out and soon, the tree will look very white and very fluffy. So far, the tree still looks quite bare, but the pictures below show that the tree is just starting to reveal its colours. It shouldn't be too long before the tree has leaves again, and it won't seem long until summer- or am I getting ahead of myself!

The colour of a spring garden is probably my most favourite part of the plant year. The bright white of the blossom really does stand out. I bet many of you are seeing some colour changes in your gardens too. Maybe not on a tree but in some early flowers, you will be sure to find some interesting colous at this time of year.

The close up picture of the blossom directly above has got to be my favourite. Its often not until you get a close up view like that that you notice the other colours in just one twig of blossom. The reds and greens, browns and pinks are shown too. Some even brighter colour are shown in other flowers in the garden at the moment, notably the Jasmine flower below. They definitely brighten up the shady area of the garden. Hopefully the bees talked about in my last posting will like these flowers too.

The birds are acting very "springy", and many of them are already paired up for the breeding season ahead. As far as I can tell, we seem to have a pair of Robins, Dunnocks, Great Tits and of course the Blue Tits which are currently visiting our camera nestbox. Also seen this morning was an extremely fast chase involving 2 male Greenfinches, possibly fighting over a female or a territory.

The Song Thrush is still visiting the garden, and a quick visit from 2 Long-tailed tits (which could also be in a pair) and a Wren tooking for insects under vegetation on the ground. I wonder if the group of around 5 House Sparrows currently visiting the garden at the moment will nest near our garden again this year. Its all very exciting stuff!I reckon that,since I live in Southern England, the spring action will be a little ahead of northern England and Scottish gardens at the moment, but I wonder what you can see on 1st March 09!

All photos taken in my garden on 1st March 09